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Holdups and Overinvestment in Physical Capital Markets

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Author Info
André Kurmann

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Abstract

Firms in many situations must make investment decisions long before they meet with new capital suppliers. In addition, most physical capital is specific to a task or location, thus implying potentially important switching costs in case negotiations between a firm and a supplier break down. The present paper analyzes the implications of these frictions. The sequentiality of investment makes it impossible to write binding ex-ante contracts. Together with the rents arising from switching costs, this implies a holdup problem. In partial equilibrium, firms react strategically by overinvesting so as to reduce their marginal productivity and thus the price of capital they negotiate with their suppliers upon matching. In general equilibrium, the holdup problem interacts with externalities from switching costs, resulting in inefficient allocations. In a more general macroeconomic context, the holdup problem in physical capital markets interacts with holdup problems in labor markets that typically lead to underinvestment. As long as capital and labor are complements, this presents the firm with a trade-off between overinvestment and overemployment that neutralizes, at least partially, the distortionary effects of each of the two holdup problems.

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Paper provided by CIRPEE in its series Cahiers de recherche with number 0904.

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Date of creation: 2009
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Handle: RePEc:lvl:lacicr:0904

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Related research
Keywords: Holdup problems; Trading frictions; Investment; Strategic bargaining;

Find related papers by JEL classification:
D23 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights
D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Capital and Total Factor Productivity; Capacity
E22 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomics: Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Capital; Investment; Capacity

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